HAIL HAIL CAESAR

O'Neill turns to Shakespeare when asked if Well boss Askou could be next man in Parkhead hotseat.

- MICHAEL GANNON

IT'S not often you get a football manager quoting Shakespeare in a pre-match press conferences.

But than again, Martin O'Neill is not like most managers.

In a week with difficult questions about the fallout from last weekend's Ibrox carry-on, the Celtic boss might have been looking forward to being asked about the Motherwell game.

Only to run into more awkward poses regarding the man in the opposite dugout.

As if this season wasn't weird enough, O'Neill is now going up against the boss a lot of Hoops fans would fancy being the next man in charge at Parkhead.

Jens Berthel Askou has been thrust into the running for the Celts hotseat on the back of his stunning work at Fir Park.

There's certainly something Shakespearean about the old master facing a young pretender so perhaps it was appropriate he dug out the famous "tides of men" line from Julius Caesar about seizing the moment when you are hot property.

O'Neill said: "It is unfair of me to be even taking questions about it from a Motherwell point of view.

"If I'm a Motherwell fan, I'm saying 'what the hell's O'Neill talking about there? He shouldn't even be discussing it'.

"But he has done exceptionally well. Really, really well.

"So when people start to do well, then there's that great Shakespeare's Julius Caesar thing... 'There's a time taken at the tides of a man' or some b****** like that, about when your stock is really high and it's very, very high with him.